Netherlands highways will glow in the dark starting in mid-2013

The road will inform drivers when it is slippery.

A smart road design that features glow-in-the-dark tarmac and illuminated weather indicators will be installed in the Netherlands from mid-2013.

"One day I was sitting in my car in the Netherlands, and I was amazed by these roads we spend millions on but no one seems to care what they look like and how they behave," the designer behind the concept, Daan Roosegaarde, told Wired.co.uk. "I started imagining this Route 66 of the future where technology jumps out of the computer screen and becomes part of us."

The Smart Highway by Studio Roosegaarde and infrastructure management group Heijmans won Best Future Concept at the Dutch Design Awards, and has already gone beyond pure concept. The studio has developed a photo-luminising powder that will replace road markings—it charges up in sunlight, giving it up to ten hours of glow-in-the-dark time come nightfall. "It's like the glow in the dark paint you and I had when we were children," designer Roosegaarde explained, "but we teamed up with a paint manufacture and pushed the development. Now, it's almost radioactive".

Special paint will also be used to paint markers like snowflakes across the road's surface—when temperatures fall to a certain point, these images will become visible, indicating that the surface will likely be slippery. Roosegaarde says this technology has been around for years, on things like baby food—the studio has just upscaled it.

The first few hundred metres of glow in the dark, weather-indicating road will be installed in the province of Brabant in mid-2013, followed by priority induction lanes for electric vehicles, interactive lights that switch on as cars pass and wind-powered lights within the next five years.

The idea is to not only use more sustainable methods of illuminating major roads, thus making them safer and more efficient, but to rethink the design of highways at the same time as we continue to rethink vehicle design. As Studio Roosegaarde sees it, connected cars and internal navigation systems linked up to the traffic news represent just one half of our future road management systems; roads need to fulfill their end of the bargain and become intelligent, useful drivers of information too.

"Research on smart transportation systems and smart roads has existed for over 30 years—call any transportation and infrastructure specialist and you'll find out yourself," Studio Roosegaarde comunications partner Emina Sendijarevic told Wired.co.uk. "What's lacking is the implementation of those innovations and making those innovations intuitive and valuable to the end-consumers—drivers. For this, a mentality change needs to take place within a country and its people, but also within a company such as Heijmans.

"This is a story that goes beyond the 'Smart Highway' as such—it's about the fact that Heijmans and Roosegaarde are not going to wait any longer for innovations to find their way through the political system, but will start building this highway now."

All together, the studio has around 20 ideas that will eventually be rolled out and it has had inquiries from countries across the globe—"India is really keen on it; they have a lot of blackouts there, it would be hallelujah to them."

Roosegaarde also hopes to take his designs to the US west coast, where companies like Google already have autonomous vehicles driving round their campuses: "It amazes me that most innovation in the west coast is screen based—I always imagined that technology jumping out of our screens and becoming part of our environment. It's incredibly important we keep imagining what our reality is going to look like. A lot of people have told me along the way that what I wanted could not be done, and it's my job to prove them wrong."

The Roosegaarde design promise comes as UK authorities announce that lights on motorways, residential streets and footpaths will be turned off or dimmed from as early as 9pm to save money (hundreds of thousands of pounds, in some cases) and to meet green targets.

Some councils are, however, taking on the burden of installing new lights with dimmers, the cost of which will mean they will need to wait four to five years before they recoup the money—by which time, they could have conserved cash for more efficient and safer ways to save on lighting costs. A Sunday Telegraph report has also revealed that nearly 5,000km of motorways and trunk roads in England are already unlit, 75km have their lights switched off between midnight and 5am and 73 percent of 134 councils surveyed switch off or dim lights, or plan to. Fully switching the lights off on major roads saved the Highways Agency just £400,000 in 2011.

Paul Watters, head of roads policy at the AA, told the Telegraph: "We do know that most accidents happen in the dark. It's also comforting for people, especially if they arrive back from somewhere in the night, when they have got a late train. There are also suggestions that it increases crime. So it may save money in terms of energy but then you have to look at the cost in terms of security, safety and accidents, it may actually be more."

According to a report by car insurance company Zurich Connect, there is an 11 percent increase in claims immediately following the winter clock change in the UK, when nights get darker earlier.

What's the climate in the Netherlands? How much of the time will they get enough sunlight each day to make this a useful improvement instead of a cute artistic project? How effective and how visible will this paint be in cold temperatures, under snow or ice?

Just seems like more light pollution to me. I'd rather the car be smart and interact with the local data to inform you of dangerous ahead.

If it replaces or reduces conventional lighting, I would think it would reduce light pollution by keeping the light where you actually need it -- on the road -- instead of spilling over into housing developments and such.

On another topic: While I feel that improvements to the actual roadways are also needed in addition to vehicle improvements, in a country like the US we are looking at something like a 50 year rollout on an even larger scale than building the initial interstate highway system. I don't see it happening. It it were to happen, it would be obsolete long before we finished it. And if the will and money were there, I'd rather see upgrades in our aging but heavily used freight rail system, improved public transit and other options besides enabling a petrochemical based single car structure -- like building out electrical charging stations and such so we can still have our cars while diversifying the power portfolio that juices them up.

In short -- it might work in a small country like The Netherlands but I think you'd be hard pressed to get it to work on the scale of a country the size of the US or Canada or even Australia.

Ahem, just in case it is not obvious, he does not mean "almost radioactive" literally. He just means it glows really well.

If there is snow or ice to the extent that it is covering the painted snowflakes, then the painted snowflakes are not necessary. The painted snowflakes are for those times when the roads are not *completely* covered in snow, but when conditions for driving may be dangerous nevertheless.

Also, these road markings will be no more distracting than existing reflective markings. They will just allow one to see further down that curve than what you currently can with your headlights.

I can see the temp-sensitive technology being useful as an augmentation to the 'Bridge ices before road' signs. Specifically, providing an active external indicator that the temperature is in the range where the bridge may be icy.

Doesn't replace the need to pay attention, but would serve as a better reminder than the signs that are posted regardless of the temperature.

If it's snowing, then it covers up the road, making drivers unable to see the markings. On the other hand, if the snow has melted on the road, but it is still snowing, then drivers will be perfectly aware that it is snowing and slippery outside. Ditto with rain.

Provided the road surface isn't obscured, these marking should only serve as a for highlighting lanes and traditional markings. They will only really be useful on lightly traveled, unlit, unobscured roads.

If it's snowing, then it covers up the road, making drivers unable to see the markings. On the other hand, if the snow has melted on the road, but it is still snowing, then drivers will be perfectly aware that it is snowing and slippery outside. Ditto with rain.

Provided the road surface isn't obscured, these marking should only serve as a for highlighting lanes and traditional markings. They will only really be useful on lightly traveled, unlit, unobscured roads.

Ah, but the article mentioned nothing about actual precipitation. It just said, "...[be able to] paint markers like snowflakes across the road's surface—when temperatures fall to a certain point, these images will become visible, indicating that the surface will likely be slippery."

It isn't necessarily for the obvious "Oh look, snow" conditions, its more for the "It's pretty cold and there may be residual moisture on the road, making it deceptively slippery. Here's a reminder." conditions.

A huge waste of paint, but if streetlights are going to be removed, I'd say just painting the entire width of the road would be better. You'll know how much room you have then. That or simply redo/trace the lines themselves with such paint to give an idea of road condition, where the borders are in the darkness, and be less distracting than snowflake and sun designs.

Just seems like more light pollution to me. I'd rather the car be smart and interact with the local data to inform you of dangerous ahead.

If it replaces or reduces conventional lighting, I would think it would reduce light pollution by keeping the light where you actually need it -- on the road -- instead of spilling over into housing developments and such.

Actually you've got it backwards. While they'll probably be dimmer than the sodium vapor bulbs they're intended to replace, the glow strips are lights pointing strait up; this is the absolute worst configuration for minimizing light pollution/trespass/glare. What you want to minimize that is lights illuminating from from above that are hooded so that all the light shines on what you want to illuminate and none escapes up (to create skyglow) or horizontally (glare/light tresspass). When properly installed you should only see the light where it's shining on what it's intended to illuminate; and never the bulb directly because when you can do so the light shining directly into your eyes only serves to adjust your eyes for brighter conditions reducing your ability to see anything.

If it's snowing, then it covers up the road, making drivers unable to see the markings. On the other hand, if the snow has melted on the road, but it is still snowing, then drivers will be perfectly aware that it is snowing and slippery outside. Ditto with rain.

Provided the road surface isn't obscured, these marking should only serve as a for highlighting lanes and traditional markings. They will only really be useful on lightly traveled, unlit, unobscured roads.

The obscuration is mostly a problem on lightly traveled roads. If you've got a decent amount of traffic, tire marks/ruts serve as usable lane markers. It's when the snow fall has completely covered any marks from the last car that the pucker factor really starts to ramp up since figuring out where the edge of the road is can get much more difficult.

"According to a report by car insurance company Zurich Connect, there is an 11 percent increase in claims immediately following the winter clock change in the UK, when nights get darker earlier."

... Is this effect due to the lighting, or the tiredness of the drivers?

Since the clocks changed on Sunday morning I'm shocked by the number of idiots driving along in the dark with no lights on or with full-beams turned on dazzling everyone unfortunate enough to be in front of them.

I'll admit to having on occasion forgetting to turn my lights on when setting off on a well lit road but the most I've ever gone is 100yards or so before realising. These people are driving passed multiple people who flash their lights at them as a warning but they just plough on oblivious (probably wondering why these people are flashing their lights).

There really needs to be ways of getting the idiots off the road, who drive around oblivious to everything around them and causing danger to the rest of us. At the moment they seem to concentrate on speed cameras, which catch people driving 5mph over the limit on empty roads but don't catch the really dangerous people who drive slowly (often so slow they become dangerous) and veer across the road in front of people without warning.

Just seems like more light pollution to me. I'd rather the car be smart and interact with the local data to inform you of dangerous ahead.

If it replaces or reduces conventional lighting, I would think it would reduce light pollution by keeping the light where you actually need it -- on the road -- instead of spilling over into housing developments and such.

Actually you've got it backwards. While they'll probably be dimmer than the sodium vapor bulbs they're intended to replace, the glow strips are lights pointing strait up; this is the absolute worst configuration for minimizing light pollution/trespass/glare. What you want to minimize that is lights illuminating from from above that are hooded so that all the light shines on what you want to illuminate and none escapes up (to create skyglow) or horizontally (glare/light tresspass). When properly installed you should only see the light where it's shining on what it's intended to illuminate; and never the bulb directly because when you can do so the light shining directly into your eyes only serves to adjust your eyes for brighter conditions reducing your ability to see anything.

If the paint is limited to highways and interstates, perhaps it won't have such a noticeable effect. I get the impression that, even with the paint facing the sky, interstate lights cause more pollution than the paint would. The average roads in the suburbs would do well to just stay dark at night.

Just seems like more light pollution to me. I'd rather the car be smart and interact with the local data to inform you of dangerous ahead.

If it replaces or reduces conventional lighting, I would think it would reduce light pollution by keeping the light where you actually need it -- on the road -- instead of spilling over into housing developments and such.

Actually you've got it backwards. While they'll probably be dimmer than the sodium vapor bulbs they're intended to replace, the glow strips are lights pointing strait up; this is the absolute worst configuration for minimizing light pollution/trespass/glare. What you want to minimize that is lights illuminating from from above that are hooded so that all the light shines on what you want to illuminate and none escapes up (to create skyglow) or horizontally (glare/light tresspass). When properly installed you should only see the light where it's shining on what it's intended to illuminate; and never the bulb directly because when you can do so the light shining directly into your eyes only serves to adjust your eyes for brighter conditions reducing your ability to see anything.

If the overhead lighting is to be effective it needs as much coming up off the road (as this is what you see) and thus you've immediately got as much light pollution. Plus you will never be 100% effective at getting the light to only go where you want it as this would require every light to have custom covers fitted to direct the light accurately onto the piece of road that it overhangs. Thus you get MORE light pollution from the overhead lighting.

It isn't necessarily for the obvious "Oh look, snow" conditions, its more for the "It's pretty cold and there may be residual moisture on the road, making it deceptively slippery. Here's a reminder." conditions.

The condition you describe is the far more prevalent one in the Netherlands rather than snow which, normally, we get very little of. What we get far more is road surfaces freezing with the moisture present in the air and from evaporation of nearby water, we're a pretty wet country which is also below sea level for large parts.

The 'accidents happen more often on unlit roads' might be a bit deceptive. I used to hate driving the motorway between Liverpool and Manchester at night, because the motorway was well lit, except for a few spots. In those dark spots, you couldn't see well, because you'd lost your night vision on the lit sections. I used to nip to Southport twice a week too, and the Formby bypass was the same way. When you got to the Southport coast road, you got your night vision back and it was fine.

It's not the 'lit' and 'unlit' that's the issue. It's the constant switching between the two.

I live in a town in Georgia now, and apart from a few lights in the town center itself, I've got 10-15 miles in any direction before I even get another streetlight (unless I'm coming home from Atlanta, where a guy has a floodlight that covers the road on my way home, at night I'll actively put my hands to obscure the light as I approach now)

I've had similar problems with emergency vehicles. They seem not to understand that you need LESS lights at night. Less bright flashy ones at least.I remember one checkpoint about 2 years ago, where I had to stop about 70 yards away and crawl in, because 10 cars with every strobe going meant I couldn't see anything, after a 10 might trip in the dark.

Back on topic a bit, when they resurfaced that road 3 years ago, it took them almost a month to put lines on it. Yeah, unlit road in the countryside, no lines, 55mph limit (and a rat-run for semi's between I20 and I75), no problem... Worse, they made the road so smooth, that when it rained, the road turned into a mirror. Headlights, even the signs were reflected in the road.

But there's nothing really new here, all highways in Denmark (and the rest of the world I assume?), have a flurosesant stripe running along each side of the road, that reflects light (from the car lights), that way you can easily see where you are on the road, and upcoming curves.

The temperature thing is just handled with electronic signs (no wear and tear on the electronic signs, and they're accurate, not vague).

Works just as well, better probably in fact. But the Dutch thing is novel.

Just seems like more light pollution to me. I'd rather the car be smart and interact with the local data to inform you of dangerous ahead.

If it replaces or reduces conventional lighting, I would think it would reduce light pollution by keeping the light where you actually need it -- on the road -- instead of spilling over into housing developments and such.

Actually you've got it backwards. While they'll probably be dimmer than the sodium vapor bulbs they're intended to replace, the glow strips are lights pointing strait up; this is the absolute worst configuration for minimizing light pollution/trespass/glare. What you want to minimize that is lights illuminating from from above that are hooded so that all the light shines on what you want to illuminate and none escapes up (to create skyglow) or horizontally (glare/light tresspass). When properly installed you should only see the light where it's shining on what it's intended to illuminate; and never the bulb directly because when you can do so the light shining directly into your eyes only serves to adjust your eyes for brighter conditions reducing your ability to see anything.

If the overhead lighting is to be effective it needs as much coming up off the road (as this is what you see) and thus you've immediately got as much light pollution. Plus you will never be 100% effective at getting the light to only go where you want it as this would require every light to have custom covers fitted to direct the light accurately onto the piece of road that it overhangs. Thus you get MORE light pollution from the overhead lighting.

This is the correct answer. Today, you have a light shining mostly down and reflecting off the entire road below, including any painted indicators. You get light pollution from the poorly shielded (if at all) light, the entire road surface that's not painted, and the painted area. With the new scheme, if it becomes an unlit road, you'd have light pollution only from the glowing paint, which could actually be dimmer since its purpose isn't road illumination and it doesn't have to be as bright to contrast with the road surface (however, if it's radioactive, it might still be really bright . In general, an emissive surface pointed at your face has to be much much dimmer than an emissive surface aimed to bounce light off another surface and into your face, which means much much less light produced.

I don't really understand all the naysayers in the rest of this thread. It's true that signage has languished in 1950s tech, so it's worth exploring, even if snow will cover it up (just like it covers everything already). Besides, hypercolor roads? It's like the dream of the early 90s, come back to life! (in Pog form, etc)

But there's nothing really new here, all highways in Denmark (and the rest of the world I assume?), have a flurosesant stripe running along each side of the road, that reflects light (from the car lights), that way you can easily see where you are on the road, and upcoming curves.

The temperature thing is just handled with electronic signs (no wear and tear on the electronic signs, and they're accurate, not vague).

Works just as well, better probably in fact. But the Dutch thing is novel.

wait, fluorescent or reflective? We definitely have (very) reflective strips in the US, but not anything fluorescent. They're good at reflecting, even in the dim periphery of headlights, but if they're out of headlights, you can't see them (which may be a good thing, I don't know).

Electronic signs definitely do undergo wear and tear, especially in cold climates, and vague is often all you need (see: radiation indicators). This new idea, providing it can continue glowing for many day/night winter/summer cycles, only depends on it staying visible, not intact. In rural areas where there is no one to do maintenance, that sounds like a perfect fit.

Just seems like more light pollution to me. I'd rather the car be smart and interact with the local data to inform you of dangerous ahead.

I honestly doubt that glow in the dark paint is going to even be noticeable if your not on the road, or even be able to challenge the thousands of obnoxious incandescent and flourescent lights that are on non-stop the world over.

If its anything like the concept picture, I imagine it will be pretty aesthetically pleasing.

Just seems like more light pollution to me. I'd rather the car be smart and interact with the local data to inform you of dangerous ahead.

If it replaces or reduces conventional lighting, I would think it would reduce light pollution by keeping the light where you actually need it -- on the road -- instead of spilling over into housing developments and such.

Actually you've got it backwards. While they'll probably be dimmer than the sodium vapor bulbs they're intended to replace, the glow strips are lights pointing strait up; this is the absolute worst configuration for minimizing light pollution/trespass/glare. What you want to minimize that is lights illuminating from from above that are hooded so that all the light shines on what you want to illuminate and none escapes up (to create skyglow) or horizontally (glare/light tresspass). When properly installed you should only see the light where it's shining on what it's intended to illuminate; and never the bulb directly because when you can do so the light shining directly into your eyes only serves to adjust your eyes for brighter conditions reducing your ability to see anything.

Direct light is exactly the same as reflected light. There is in principle no difference between light that is reflected off the road and the exact same light that is emitted by the road directly. I'm imagining a gently glowing strip or road that does not blind anybody and does not have the driver strain to see where the next turn is coming.

If it's snowing, then it covers up the road, making drivers unable to see the markings. On the other hand, if the snow has melted on the road, but it is still snowing, then drivers will be perfectly aware that it is snowing and slippery outside. Ditto with rain.

Provided the road surface isn't obscured, these marking should only serve as a for highlighting lanes and traditional markings. They will only really be useful on lightly traveled, unlit, unobscured roads.

I also see an issue with the time-of-visibility for crowded roads. You'll only see it flash briefly between the back-end of the car in front of you and your own front-end. Just seems like more info-clutter that's less than useful.

I don't need more busy crap to distract me while I drive. And I'm perfectly capable of checking the air temperature outside using the thermometer readout included with nearly every new car sold.

But does that temperature gauge in your car tell you the temperature of the road surface, which is what really matters when you need to be concerned about black ice? I can see where some warning that the bridge pavement is below freeze would help avoid accidents.

Read about 5 comments before I gave up. What's with the negativity directed at this? I thought it was quite a clever idea. Whether it's a viable solution in the United States does not change the fact that the idea itself is potentially useful. Either way it seems like we should see how the test implementations of it play out before we start pointing out how flawed or ridiculous it is.

I find one of the hardest times for me to locate the lines on the road while driving is when it's raining out. I think not having street lights reflecting off of the the wet pavement, and instead having the light emanating from the ground itself, could be quite helpful.

If it's snowing, then it covers up the road, making drivers unable to see the markings. On the other hand, if the snow has melted on the road, but it is still snowing, then drivers will be perfectly aware that it is snowing and slippery outside. Ditto with rain.

Apparently where you live/drive, black ice is not a problem? Lucky you.

I must be missing something here. Lighting up the road with snowflakes when it's snowing? Doesn't that mean it will be covered up after a few millimeters of snow falls and collects? What's the point?

Snowflakes are a sort of universal shorthand for "cold enough to freeze", hence "cold enough to form black ice". (Kind of like how those pictures of penguins on the sides of medical-supply shipping packages mean "must be kept frozen", not "contains penguins".)

If it winds up being cheap and helpful, it'll creep in--roads do get resurfaced every few years. Rumble strips were a great idea, and relatively cheap(?)--they appear to be a texture, probably just a heavy specialized vehicle driven over the near-finalized asphalt.

The other issue is that we may be getting into computer-driven cars soon--these cars would work better with localized sensors and data reports, and probably real-time analysis of the road (sensing micro slips in traction, water on the surface, temps, etc).

The terminator was capable of driving without headlights, because he could see in the non-visible spectrum. We could adapt to computer cars using IR lights to see and drive--but this would probably harm pedestrians and manual drivers who couldn't see the IR lights as a warning. Still no reason why we couldn't use some IR lighting for some things, just needs to be planned around. This goes for things like distractiveness of the snowflakes on the road surface.

One could maybe make road signs (up off the road) that display warnings within certain sensor parameters--so instead of warning me that the bridge may be slipperier than the other road, it can tell me that it is dangerous NOW. There are a lot of improvements, but the key is making them safely and cheaply.